Commentary on cancer research, information on supplements and treatments, relevant book reviews, links to useful sites and other information that cancer sufferers, their families and friends may find useful.

The opening line of the paper makes plain why these results
are important:

A cornerstone of modern biomedical research is the use of
mouse models to explore basic pathophysiological mechanisms, evaluate new
therapeutic approaches, and make go or no-go decisions to carry new drug
candidates forward into clinical trials.

And it’s true enough in most areas of medicine, but none
more so than in cancer research, where the mouse model is king. But the only
problem is that mouse models don’t always match human disease profiles at all
well. In the specific case that this paper outlines, it turns out that mouse
models of massive inflammatory responses in critically ill patients are miles
apart. To quote from the paper again:

The success rate is even worse for those trials in the field of inflammation, a condition present in many human diseases. To date, there have been nearly 150 clinical trials testing candidate agents intended to block the inflammatory response in critically ill patients, and every one of these trials failed.

The reason for this divergence turns out to be because the
relationship between genes changed in human patients bears little relationship
to the genes expressed in the mouse models of the diseases – the relationship is
pretty much random. However, for years scientists who have been studying these
diseases have focused on drugs that work for mice and then these drugs have
subsequently failed in humans. Not only has this cost millions, it also means
that much research effort has been wasted in targeting genes that have nothing
to do with human diseases. It also means that potentially useful drugs have
been abandoned precisely because they failed to do anything in mice.
And it’s not just inflammatory diseases at stake – the same
is true in cancer research. We can only speculate on how much money, effort and
intellectual energy has been wasted on research that doesn’t apply to people.
The reliance on test tubes and mouse models means that much time and effort has
been for nothing.